Lattice Weave Parure: Bracelet

Yay! I just finished the bracelet. Now on to the necklace and earrings.

Kim Miles Beads

I've mentioned before that I am an ardent fan of beadist Kim Miles. Here is a recent purchase, a mosaic tile bead. I love this bead and I wear it all the time.

My mom gave me the pink flower Kim Miles bead in this bracelet I made. (Thanks, Mom!!) It's one of my favorite bracelets to wear in the summer. And check out the cute little silver dragonflies! It also has citrine, chalcedony, iolite, quartz, garnet, Swarovski Crystal, and one Czech glass bead. The silver is all sterling silver.

And this bracelet I made for my mom with her purple and orange flower Kim Miles bead. I love the colors in that bead.

The bracelets were a lot of fun to make. I'm very much a pattern person and these were a bit outside the box for me. I was striving to be random and that was really hard. Usually even when I try to be random I will see little patterns emerging!

And now, I'm off to play outside with N. It's a beautiful day here.

Tag! I'm it.

I've been tagged by Jenn. It's my first time being tagged, so we'll see how it goes. For this tag, you have to google your first name, followed by "needs." I googled "Christina needs" and everything had to do with a famous singer who shares my name. So, I decided to google my nickname and that was much more entertaining. And some might be cut a bit for entertainment purposes. :) So, here's what "Tina needs."

1. Tina (the slut).
Wait a minute! I don't like how this tagging thing is shaping up.
2. Stamp it chick.
Chick?
3. Tina needs sleep.
Amen.
4. What the world needs now is DDT.
Does it really? Isn't DDT a dangerous chemical?
5. Gray/white kitty needs a home.
My cat Season isn't very sociable - and she was here first. Sorry, kitty.
6. Apparently I need Viagra, but there is no bloody way in the world.
Tina is a female name, right?
7. Novamind: the best way to enhance your personal effectiveness.
Is this in addition to Viagra...?
8. TINA!?! And getting there.
After numbers 6 and 7, I'm afraid to ask.
9. Am I right?
Please. Of course I'm right.
10. Human Sexuality: Meeting Your Basic Needs
Apparently, there's Viagra involved.

Thanks for the laugh, Jenn. :)

And now, because I'm new at this, I'll share the fun with another new blogger.

Jessi :)

Sun's out.

Ah, finally...sunshine. After a rainy, dreary week, it's good to see the sun. I wish I could plant some flowers today, but it really is too early. I think the general rule of thumb around here is not to plant flowers before Mother's Day - unless you are planting a flower that likes cold weather, like pansies (which I love). I get so antsy to start planting at this time of the year. Instead, I'll content myself with some beaded flowers for the moment.

The white flowers are some that I found in an antique shop. They are made with wire, also known as French beaded flowers. I'm always on the lookout for beaded flowers. The small bottle it's in was beaded by my cousin for me. The tiny orange vase with pink flowers was made by the amazing Kim Miles. Check out her blog as well. She is another rock star of the bead world. I have several of her beads. I bought this vase from her one year at the Bead and Button Show. I made the tiny flowers in it from beads and thread from a pattern created by Diane Fitzgerald. They are made with herringbone stitch (also called ndebele (en-da-belly)). I have the pattern from a class I took with her, but I think there is a pattern for Tiny Tulips in her book that is the same thing. I love that she created ways to make flowers with beads and thread instead of wire.

In the background you can see our patchy grass coming in. We really need some flowers back there.

Lastly, a shout out to my husband who, right this very minute is running the Country Music Marathon. You are amazing!

Flowery Friday

I learned how to make this sweet little hexagonal box from Judy Walker in a Bead & Button Show class. My mom and my aunt took the class, too. My mom gave me her box because I liked it so much. I don't have a photo handy of that one. One day I'll post about things she's made. My aunt went on to make a much larger box with flowers on each panel. I've tried to convince her to give it to me, but no luck so far. I'll take a picture the next time I'm at her house and post it. The hexagonal box below has forget-me-nots in it - that's how small it is! I think it stands about an inch or 1.5 inches tall with the lid on.



One of the downsides to moving is that I miss my old flower garden. Right now we have some grass in the backyard, but that's it. I don't have anywhere to put my reading fairy.

Maybe I can pull out some pots and plant some flowers this weekend if the weather is nice.

Homestretch.

Thanks, everyone, for the nice comments about the beaded piece I made for my mom. :)

One thing I like about having this blog is that it helps keep me motivated. After my last post I was focused on finishing the toggle bracelet. Now all of the components for the Lattice Weave Parure are complete and I can work on putting it all together.

You can see I've already started. This is the center of the bracelet. The bracelet starts from the center in order to ensure the flower is centered on the wrist. I have a lot of bead jump rings to make, but those are easy to do while watching television or chatting on the phone. I'm in the homestretch now. The bracelet actually wraps around the wrist more than once. It's quite pretty. Please excuse the slightly fuzzy picture. The lighting was terrible and my camera doesn't seem to like close-ups.

I ought to be able to make some jumprings tonight, as the weather here is quite dreary and we won't be playing outside or practicing riding a bike without training wheels (N. is doing quite well with that by the way!).

I wore my new sandals I posted about yesterday to make sure they were comfortable and my feet were freezing all day. Plus, I looked lovely wearing fancy sandals around the house with my sweats. Gorgeous. I've decided they're definitely worth keeping. I love Camper shoes. The sandals I bought are part of their Twins line. Twins are slightly different from another.

Thanks, Jenn, for the kind words. You were my main inspiration for starting my own blog! :)

First, eggs. Then, I must bead.

This morning as we were eating cereal together, N. put in his dinner request of scrambled eggs, [turkey] bacon, and toast. I love eating breakfast food for dinner. I remembered reading about the best way to make scrambled eggs on Jenn Maruska's blog and I'm going to give that a whirl. Who knew there was a correct way to make scrambled eggs?

And then I really must sit down and finish the one last clasp for the lattice weave parure. I must. Seriously.

The weather here is in the low 50s and rainy - so dreary! - but my new shoes arrived to cheer me up and keep me hopeful that nice weather will arrive soon and stay for more than a day at a time.

And now I'm off to the kitchen. Wish me luck.

This was a challenge.

Peyote is my favorite beading stitch. I like the way all the beads nestle into their little spots and it's usually easy to see if I've missed a stitch or run into some other sort of trouble. I made this piece for my mom. The pattern was 28 pages long! 28 pages! And it was only offered as a text pattern - no pictures. Often patterns for items such as this are a picture chart, similar to that of counted cross-stitch. It was a really fun project to work on because it was challenging. The further away from this piece that you are, the easier it is to see the woman's face. That proved to be another challenge; while working on the piece up close the face is so subtle that I couldn't see it emerging. I kept asking my husband if he could see a face because I couldn't see anything but rows of colors. Without having a picture to compare it to, I had to have a lot of faith that it was going to work out. I'd say this took me around 12 hours to complete. My mom had it framed, so it looks a bit nicer than the photo below.

I bought the pattern for Rohannan - Queen of the Lightsworn on Bead-Patterns.com. The pattern was created by Catherine Vondenhuevel.

Oops - I made a mistake and misread the amount of pages listed in the pattern. It was 10 pages and 28 colors. 10 pages of straight text is still quite a lot - it sure felt like 28!

Okay, so I didn't bead as planned...

My plan for Sunday was to make the toggle clasp for the Lattice Weave Parure so that I can start putting it together. But, the weather was so gorgeous that other things took priority. Things like teaching N. to ride a bike without training wheels.

And making more sunflower books. Also, notice the very cute pink beaded snowflake in this picture that my cousin made. She's a very talented beader.

Here's an inside shot of the sunflower book. N. is learning about plants and how they grow, so this is carrying over into his artwork.

And now, because this is primarily a blog about beading, I'll leave you with a picture of some beady things: a lampshade on a lamp that belonged to my husband's grandparents, a frame with beaded flowers, and best of all, some beaded flowers that my cousin made. She made flowers for everyone in the family for Christmas one year. I love them.

Beautiful Day

The weather is gorgeous here today. A good day to play outside, maybe draw some roads on the driveway.

Something to Look Forward to

I was perusing Amazon and found this book by Laura McCabe. I love her stuff! I've taken a few classes from her and she's a very good instructor. If you ever have the chance to take a class with her, do. In fact, I think my next project is going to be a kit that I bought from her for a passion flower vessel. Also, she has a space on her homepage to sign up for Laura's Bead Club. It's basically her monthly newsletter and she also has kits that are only available to members of the club. I've ordered several things from her site and it's always a pleasant experience. The passion flower kit I mentioned was ordered through her bead club. I wish this book was going to be out sooner. For now I'll put it on my Amazon wishlist.

Look at all that sparkle. Sigh.

In other news, I only have a clasp left to make for the Lattice Weave Parure. After that I can start linking all of the pieces together. I had hoped to get the clasp made last night, but that hasn't worked out. N. kept keeping me busy with playing outside and making paper sunflowers that have little books attached to the center of the flower. He's so creative.

Today we are heading to Chicago to visit my brother and sister-in-law.

I'm hoping I can find some time time to work on the Lattice Weave Parure on Sunday. Happy weekend!

And That Led to This

After making a few of the rings in my last post, I played around a little bit with right angle weave (RAW) and made this cute little box. I love little beaded boxes and bowls and baskets and...I could go on and on. I hadn't done a lot of RAW before this, so it was fun to play around and see how it works. When you ask people, it seems to be one of those stitches they either love or hate; no middle ground. I haven't done much with that stitch since this, so I don't know where that puts me. I didn't hate it, but I guess I didn't love it enough to go crazy making everything I could with RAW. It's a good stitch to know. You should give it a whirl and decide which camp you're in: love it or hate it.

Rings 'n Things

I don't have any photos of earrings that I've made handy, Jenn, so hopefully a ring will do for now. I'll have to look in my jewelry box and pull out some of the earrings I've made and take a few pictures.

I made this ring in a class, but I don't have any idea where it is. Hmm. I happened to come across the photo on my computer. Anyway, after making the one above, I made this one:

I wear this green and pink one all the time. It's a fun bit of bling to wear. I'm all about the sparkle.

Masterpieces

One of the [many] joys of having a 6-year old is that I get to act like a kid again and do all sorts of fun childhood things. While our house was being built, we used to go to the construction site and find rocks. We found a few large ones that we have near our step now. At the time the house was being built we lived with my in-laws and, after finding our rocks, we'd put them in their landscaping areas. My mother-in-law liked how it looked and has requested that N. and I find some rocks for her. That's a nice idea, except that any rocks N. finds that he likes go right into our rock pile! It's growing larger by the day. Anyway, last night we walked in an area of the neighborhood that's still under construction and found some great rocks. (Sorry, Linda, these are going right into N.'s rock pile!) On our way home we decided to paint some of the rocks. N. painted a snail and "a round, brown and yellow colorful rock" and I painted a red bird for him.

We have all sorts of plans for things to paint on other rocks in our rock pile. But, I think N. is planning another rock hunting excursion for tonight.

Flowers

Here are some beaded lavendar flowers I made a while back. In fact, it's been quite a while, as this picture was taken in our old house. Last night we learned that one of our friends lost his father over the weekend. That news—along with what's happening in Virginia—makes flowers seem like a good choice for the day.

Earrings

I make a lot of earrings, especially when I need something to match an outfit or if I have a special event to attend. I like to make earrings between larger projects because they are quick and easy. Instant gratification. But, in a bit of departure, I made these earrings. Well, there's only one finished in the photo, but really they're both finished. They are from a Cynthia Rutledge class. They are about as close to instant gratification as a Cynthia project gets. These earrings have Indian Sapphires and some Swarovski crystals that are meant to look like semi-precious stones. The colors are very earthy. I thought they would be too large for me, but I find that I wear them a lot.

Also take notice of my favorite green sewing book (how did I ever live without it?!) and hedgehog pincushion. Both are products of Jenn Maruska Design.

A Mischevious Snapdragon

"Mischief is your middle name, but your first is friend. You are quite the prankster that loves to make other people laugh."

I am a Snapdragon What Flower Are You?

I like to make people laugh, but I don't know if I'd describe myself as a prankster. Hmm.

Current Project: Lattice Weave Parure

I'm making great headway on the Lattice Weave Parure, a class and kit by Cynthia Rutledge. In my opinion, Cynthia is one of the rock stars of the bead world. She's an awesome teacher and she has some really great kits as well. Here's a picture of my progress:

The green components are the beads from Cynthia's kit. The pink flowers are my own colors, maybe for a future bracelet. Cynthia's kits are very detailed and time consuming, but so worth it.

April [Snow] Showers Bring...A Snowman.

Just right.

I love that moment when I'm making something and all the colors come together and are just right. Everyone has their own just right. It's always interesting to me to be in a class and see everyone making the same thing with different colors and the pieces are completely changed. These beaded beads are a Diane Fitzgerald design. The colors are my just right.